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Week 36, 2006
THE BEST SELLERS (recent popular articles):
1) KDKA TV: Suburban mom goes on strike [Une mère fait grève pour dénoncer ses enfants qui ne font rien à la maison.]

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THE REGULARS: Summary
2 ) Le texte plus abordable de la semaine/Scholastic: How will you remember? [Un groupe propose de commémorer le 5ème anniversaire du 11 septembre en faisant du bénévolat.]
3) Puzzle: Dried potatoes [Un casse-tête]
4) AUDIO/Marketplace: Too many kids, not enough seats [Certaines écoles américaines sont pleines à craquer. Parmi les solutions pour créer des places pour de nouveaux élèves, des partenariats avec le privé, notamment à travers le leasing. VOUS POUVEZ ECOUTER CE REPORTAGE EN LIGNE]

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1) KDKA TV: Suburban mom goes on strike [Une mère fait grève pour dénoncer ses enfants qui ne font rien à la maison.]
http://kdka.com/watercooler/watercooler_story_153195751.html

Suburban Mom Goes On Strike, Pickets Own Home

(CBS) DEERFIELD, Ill. Being a stay-at-home mom isn't easy. The pay stinks, and you're not always properly appreciated. So a mother of three in the north suburbs decided she wouldn't take it anymore.

WBBM-TV's Alita Guillen reports on the yogurt spill that sent a mom over the edge and onto the pavement. Joanna Fishman did something she didn't want to do, but had to do, when her two boys stopped doing their daily chores. Her 7- and 9-year-old stopped making their beds, packing their own baseball gear and taking out the trash.

"I had been threatening and threatening that I was going to go on strike, and I wasn't going to do anything. And I knew if I was sitting in the house they'd still be coming to me," she said. So she made a sign and hit the sidewalk. With the help of her two-year-old, who was exempt from the strike, she chanted, "Mom on strike!" "When I was growing up, I had to make my bed and I don't even remember my mom helping me get ready for school at all," Joanna said.

After one day on strike, Joanna thought her boys got the message. Her husband even sat them down for a little talk. It turns out they didn't get it. She had to come out for day two. She picketed mostly during high traffic hours and especially when the bus came by. "My older one got off the bus and said, 'This is so embarrassing. What do I have to do to get you to go back inside?'" she recalled. "And I said, 'I told you guys if you don't start helping out, I'm going on strike.'"

That was more than a week ago. Things have gotten better, sort of. She has signs reminding the kids of their chores and is still cleaning up, but she feels she's a few steps closer to raising responsible children. As for the sign, Joanna's "going to keep it in a hidden place" just in case.

Joanna's sort of a local celebrity now. Strangers come up and congratulate her.

As for her husband, he's trying to help.

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2 ) Le texte plus abordable de la semaine/Scholastic: How will you remember? [Un groupe propose de commémorer le 5ème anniversaire du 11 septembre en faisant du bénévolat.]
http://www.scholastic.com

How Will You Remember?
9/11 group wants Americans to volunteer

By Erika DeJesus, Scholastic Kids Press Corps
August 16, 2006

On September 11, 2006, how will you remember September 11, 2001?

A nonprofit group called One Day’s Pay wants you to do a good deed. The group has set up a Web site for the fifth anniversary of 9/11 to encourage people to honor that day by volunteering. The new program was announced at a press conference at Scholastic headquarters in New York City on Wednesday.U.S. Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, and U.S. Representative Peter King, both of New York, joined the Web site’s president and co-founder David Paine at the conference.

Senator Clinton and Representative King, along with U.S. Senator Charles Schumer of New York, co-sponsored a congressional resolution to designate 9/11 as a national day of service, charity, and compassion. “This is such an appropriate way for us to mark the passing of the years since that horrible September morning, now nearly five years ago,” said Senator Clinton on Wednesday. ”Now we have a way for everyone to participate in coming forward in large ways and small to say I want to be part of showing what Americans are really like, showing our compassion, our caring and concern for one another.”

Senator Clinton told Scholastic News that 9/11 changed her as it did many people. “It changed how I spent my time as a senator and it changed my view of what we need to do to make sure this never happens again,” she said.

Representative King said 9/11 made him realize what is really important in life. “The fact that so many people in their last moments reached our to their families, made us realize we should appreciate all our families more,” the Congressman said. “On a governmental level, it’s important we dedicate all of our lives in protecting America and protecting New York. That has always been important. It became monumental after September 11.”

Senator Clinton and Representative King said they will both be taking the pledge to volunteer on 9/11. If you want to participate, you can log on to www.mygooddeed.org and pledge your deed. To “Take the Good Deed Pledge,” click on the “Post My Good Deed” button and fill out the form. What will you do?

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4) AUDIO/Marketplace: Too many kids, not enough seats [Certaines écoles américaines sont pleines à craquer. Parmi les solutions pour créer des places pour de nouveaux élèves, des partenariats avec le privé, notamment à travers le leasing. VOUS POUVEZ ECOUTER CE REPORTAGE EN LIGNE]
http://marketplace.publicradio.org/shows/2006/07/31/PM200607315.html

Monday, July 31, 2006

KAI RYSSDAL: Too many kids, not enough of those tiny little chairs. That's the math problem stumping school districts in some fast-growing communities. So some public schools are looking to the private sector to help balance the equation. From the Innovations desk at North Carolina Public Radio, Janet Babin explains.

JANET BABIN: Briar Creek Elementary is the kind of place that almost makes you wish you were back in grade school again. Brick and shiny glass exterior, spacious halls, and a room dedicated just to music class. This morning, these second graders seem eager to sing along with their teacher: "Yea, yea, yea, we're ready. Yea, yea, we're ready."

This Raleigh area school district ranks among the top in the nation. But facilities superintendent Mike Burriss says the district struggles with overcrowding:

MIKE BURRISS: We are currently at 102 percent of our capacity at the elementary schools, 24 percent of our elementary students are in mobiles or modulars.

JANET BABIN: And 7,000 new students appear each fall. To reduce the number of kids learning in double-wides, the district and the state hope to turn to the private sector. Under new state legislation, developers could build schools and then lease them back to the school district for a profit. Similar public-private collaborations already exist in other states with fast-growing populations, like Florida, Nevada and California. Proponents say these partnerships can ease overcrowding and lower taxpayer costs. Chris Sinclair heads a group of businesses that helped initiate the North Carolina legislation. He says local governments are less efficient builders than developers:

CHRIS SINCLAIR: It saves time. Construction materials are going up on a constant basis, and if you can get a school built quicker, and you can save millions of dollars over several years in interest.

JANET BABIN: These collaborations also appeal to districts that need new buildings but don't have the money to build. The Philadelphia School District will lease two privately owned buildings this fall. Philadelphia Facilities manager Len Dillinger says his district didn't have $50 million to construct new high schools. But it does have the $1.5 million he'll need to lease them. But he cautions school districts to think carefully before taking on a landlord:

LEN DILLINGER: Leasing a facility quite often, just as leasing an auto, will cost you more than buying one. You also are putting another middle man into the mix, and they're not in this as a charitable type of program. They're looking to make money as well.

JANET BABIN: Dillinger says schools and local governments can borrow money more cheaply than any private developer. So while a build-to-lease option might deliver a school faster, it won't necessarily be cheaper in the long run. That appears to be the case in Virginia, where the cost per square-foot of developer-built schools is slightly higher than its traditional schools. John Hill with Grimm and Parker Architects has worked on several of the Virginia deals. He says if a school project includes, say, a shopping center, or senior housing, then a developer can provide some ancillary benefit to the district. Otherwise, he says hiring a developer will cost taxpayers more money:

JOHN HILL: Their time and the profit their company intends to make has to come out of the project one way or another, and you're adding another layer of overhead to the whole structure. It really can't come out more cheaply than if you go directly to a school builder.

JANET BABIN: But some districts feel they can't afford to think long-term. Schools in Charlotte recently rejected a bond issue despite overflowing classrooms. And in Raleigh voters will decide on a billion-dollar school initiative this fall. Advocates here hope these public-private partnerships will at least give cash-strapped districts an option besides the double-wide trailer classroom.

In Durham. N.C., I'm Janet Babin for Marketplace.

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5) The Economist: French business [Le patriotisme économique prend quelques coups.]
http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=E1_STTQQVG

French business: Patriot games

Jun 29th 2006

A bad few weeks for those who would defend the national glory of French industry

LAST JUNE Dominique de Villepin was a hero. The dashing French prime minister had made a strong start in office. The economy was showing signs of life and unemployment was in retreat. French companies were rampant. As French businessmen went on a buying spree abroad, politicians embraced an industrial Maginot line they called “economic patriotism”. Mr de Villepin was patriot-in-chief.

A year later, France's new protectionism is looking ragged, as one grand design after another has been thwarted. In “strategic” industries such as steel, aerospace and energy, the news for the patriots has been bad. Intervention is not dead, of course; but, as the past few weeks have shown, international capital markets are restricting its scope.

The mishaps started in January when France's politicians, including Mr de Villepin, manned the barricades against Mittal Steel's hostile bid for Arcelor, a big employer in France. On June 25th, after one of the most acrimonious battles in European takeover history, Arcelor heeded its shareholders' wishes and succumbed to Mittal's advances (see article).

In February Mr de Villepin brokered a merger of Gaz de France, the state-controlled gas utility, and Suez, a private water-and-power company, to prevent a hostile bid for Suez from Italy's ENEL. Italian bankers and politicians came out so strongly in support of ENEL that it is now in a stronger position to bid for Suez. Last week Mr de Villepin discovered that not even his own ranks fully support the energy project any more and postponed it until autumn. This means that it may not happen at all.

Most recently Mr de Villepin has struggled to contain the crisis over the delay of up to seven months in deliveries of Airbus's huge A380 passenger jet. He dispatched Thierry Breton, his finance minister, to talk to other big shareholders. Mr Breton has repeatedly promised to broker a neat fix, but so far a solution has eluded him.

Defenders of state intervention argue that without it France would not have world-beaters in business, such as the two leading luxury-goods groups (LVMH and PPR), one of the biggest insurers (AXA), as well as leaders in cosmetics (L'Oréal) and food (Danone). Mittal won because of a fragmented shareholder base interested only in making a quick buck, fumes Jean-Pierre Chevènement, a former socialist government minister. He blames Europe's single market for the triumph of globalised capital, the dictatorship of cash and the contempt it shows for France's interests.

Moreover, attempts to keep the markets and foreigners at bay are by no means only a French phenomenon. The Spanish government is trying to block a takeover of Endesa, a big electricity company, by Germany's E.ON. The Italian government is meddling with the plan of Autostrade and Abertis of Spain to form the world's largest toll-highway-operator.
Deathly embrace

But there is a problem with the argument that state support produces world-beating companies. Successful French firms, such as L'Oréal and AXA, tend to be the ones the state has left alone. The companies it backed were the ones that eventually needed rescuing: Alstom, an engineering group; Bull, a computer firm; Air France, the national airline; Crédit Lyonnais, a big bank. A state guarantee allows managers to run companies irresponsibly without fear of being disciplined by shareholders or banks.

Moreover, intervention is under attack from the twin forces of regulators and the market. In the past, defensive manoeuvres often went unpunished. As investment has gradually spread across European borders, governments have come under fire from foreign shareholders, enlightened businessmen at home and the European Commission in Brussels.

The tide of international capital is not about to retreat. Most shares in listed companies in France are already owned by foreign (largely American and British) investors. Fat corporate profits are paying for mergers and acquisitions, which bring even more foreign capital into France. That money will not kowtow to Mr de Villepin or anyone else in the French government. It is a hard time to be an economic patriot.

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6) The Wall Street Journal: Make way for the sidewalk SUV [Les Américains sont tellement paresseux que les personnes valides commencent à utiliser les véhicules électriques prévus pour les handicapés moteurs.]
http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB115291408087707342-d3knU98U3xXi3xesgCRyFSfaECs_20060728.html?mod=blogs  
Culture: Make Way for the Sidewalk SUV
Motorized scooters for the disabled are finding a lucrative new market: People just sick of walking
By ELLEN GAMERMAN
July 15, 2006; Page P1

On a recent afternoon at Walt Disney World, Dennis Robles was cruising around on an electric "mobility scooter" that the park usually rents out to people with disabilities. Mr. Robles doesn't have a problem walking -- he says he was simply saving up energy for late-night dancing. "I'm pretty healthy," says the 37-year-old truck driver from Brooklyn, N.Y. "Just lazy, I guess."

The power scooter is an increasingly ubiquitous sight, with an estimated 1.2 million in use nationwide. But while the $1,000-plus vehicles have been hailed as a boon for the infirm and the elderly, they are now finding a new constituency: able-bodied people who simply don't feel like walking. In addition to theme parks like Dollywood and Minnesota's giant Mall of America, the scooters are popping up everywhere from Las Vegas casinos to grocery stores. When scooter demand outstrips supply at Wal-Mart, greeters "evaluate the situation" and make sure that people using the scooters can demonstrate a legitimate need, according to a company spokesman.

Some entrepreneurs are starting to push the vehicles as bicycles without the pedaling. City Scooter Tours, an outfit that operates in Washington and plans to extend into Chicago, offers scooters as an easy way to see the sights.

"It's kind of bad for the cause," says Janna Starr, director of disability rights and technology policy for United Cerebral Palsy, a nonprofit group. Stores and tourist attractions need to set guidelines and "not just let people come up and take off in the scooters just because they want one," she says.

Ms. Starr and some other advocates for the disabled say able-bodied riders can rile pedestrians, creating a negative image of scooter use that could hurt those who really need assistance.

In the next few years, there will likely be a lot more people buzzing down sidewalks and in supermarket aisles. The number of people aged 50 and older is expected to soar by 33 million to 118 million by 2020, according to the Census Bureau.

Cavernous stores, which tend to offer scooters for free, and big theme parks, which tend to rent them, see these scooters not only as a tool for the disabled but also as a lure for visitors who might not otherwise want to spend the day walking around. At the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minn., where all the scooters are rented out by noon most weekends, the fleet is being expanded from 30 to 45 later this year. Over the past year, Dolly Parton's Dollywood theme park in Pigeon Forge, Tenn., boosted its fleet from 55 to 70. People often bring their own scooters, but the park's rentals are a convenience for occasional users. "Our park is quite hilly," says Dollywood spokesman Pete Owens. "It's quite a handy vehicle to have."

While some companies say they don't limit ridership to disabled people, others actively encourage use to anybody who wants one. The owner of Florida Mobility, a motorized scooter vendor outside Disney World, pitches a $75 rental package by telling customers: "Ride all day and dance at night." Last month, Avis started offering motorized scooters in Las Vegas and Orlando, Fla., and for an extra $40 to $50, they will arrange for the scooter to be waiting in the trunk of the rental car. At AA Tourist Rentals in Orlando, Fla., scooter business was up 20% in the last year, an increase the company partly attributes to a spry blonde woman in the ads: "She doesn't look like there's anything wrong with her," says office manager Donna Carroll.

Karen Mckinney jumped on her first scooter in May when she and her sister and their friends took an organized scooter tour through the National Mall in Washington. (The tour company, City Scooter Tours, which is owned by rental company Scootaround, bills the trip as "a way for the entire family to experience the sights together.") The 57-year-old from Elkridge, Md., says when the group took their last trip, to Las Vegas, they tired out after all the walking and were looking for an alternative this year. They thought about taking a van tour of the monuments, but worried about the walk from the van to the sites. "None of us have a disability, but we're all getting older," she says.

Ms. Starr, of United Cerebral Palsy, says scooters are beginning to attract some of the problems associated with handicapped-accessible parking spaces -- with some riders being accused of not warranting the privilege. She says it also puts companies in the problematic position of judging who "deserves" aid and encourages them to assess disabilities -- which can be hidden -- based on appearances.

Judy Stark, 65, bought her Golden Companion scooter about two years ago on the recommendation of a friend. What started as an occasional indulgence is now becoming a more permanent part of her life -- she even walks her dog via scooter, giving Mugsy a lift on particularly hot days. Recently at the Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa in Atlantic City, N.J., she drove in laps around the casino floor, something that would have required several walking breaks before. "Now waiting on line at the buffet is no problem," she says. "You just sit there."

Power scooters caught on in the early 1990s, in part because they're a more outdoorsy alternative to motorized wheelchairs. Power wheelchairs are typically used by severely disabled people because they're steered via a joystick, which requires less upper body strength to steer than the scooter's handlebars.

When industry leader Pride Mobility Products began selling its Victory scooter in 1992, it promoted "sleek styling" and personalized options. In recent years, scooter manufacturers have pushed it even further -- the tail lights on a Landlex scooter are reminiscent of a sports car's. Prices are as low as $1,000, down from twice that, as cheaper scooters from Asia flood the market.

Scooters are now being designed for specific uses. The SmartKart by Dane Technologies, for example, maxes out at three miles per hour, instead of the standard five, because it is meant to be used in grocery stores and other crowded indoor spaces. In the last year, Pride has super-sized models like the Maxima and introduced the Celebrity-X, to keep up with the increase in obesity.

Even some riders say it's not easy for them to decide if they really need a scooter. On a recent trip to Foxwoods Resort Casino in Connecticut, John Hopkins refused to rent a scooter, despite urgings from his daughter. The 66-year-old retiree, who had a quadruple bypass four years ago and suffers from the effects of a stroke, says he struggled on foot at the casino but thinks scooters are "a pain" that get in the way of other people and cause traffic jams. Plus, "there's a vanity part," he says. "I'd just rather do it on my own."

John Warchalowsky, 81, says he's been using a scooter for years. A retired phone-company manager from Bergenfield, N.J., Mr. Warchalowsky has taken his scooter to the Grand Canyon, on Caribbean cruises and to every state in the nation, including Alaska. When the green one conked out, he replaced it with a fire-engine red scooter and kept on touring with his girlfriend, who also rides one. He says he walks around his house and remains active, but the scooter gets him out more. Another benefit: He always buys cheap tickets to shows at casinos, because he knows he'll be put in a better spot. "I tell the usher, how do I get all the way back there? And he puts us right in the mezzanine with the handicapped people."

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7 ) The Economist: Work-life balance [Certaines entreprises tentent de promouvoir un meilleur équilibre travail-vie perso.]
http://www.economist.com/business/displaystory.cfm?story_id=7055931

Work-life balance: Life beyond pay

Jun 15th 2006

Are you a “binge worker” ? Do you “chunk” your career? Companies are having to find new ways to attract and retain skilled workers

A NEW magazine was published in America this month. Success is the resurrection of a title first published in 1897 by Orison Swett Marden, an entrepreneur and author of a series of self-help books, including “Getting the Most Out of Life”. The magazine's publisher, Joseph Guerriero, wants today's Success to reflect the contemporary workplace, where, he says, success is measured less by money and titles, and more by what is sweepingly referred to as “work-life balance”. The first issue contains an article about men leaving work to become full-time fathers.

Improving the balance between the working part of the day and the rest of it is a goal of a growing number of workers in rich Western countries. Some are turning away from the ideals of their parents, for whom work always came first; others with scarce skills are demanding more because they know they can get it. Employers, caught between a falling population of workers and tight controls on immigration, are eager to identify extra perks that will lure more “talent” their way. Just now they are focusing on benefits (especially flexible working) that offer employees more than just pay.

Some companies saw the change of mood some time ago. IBM has more than 50 different programmes promoting work-life balance and Bank of America over 30. But plenty of other firms remain unconvinced and many lack the capacity to cater to such ideas even if they wanted to. Helen Murlis, with Hay Group, a human-resources consultancy, sees a widening gap between firms “at the creative end of employment” and those that are not.

The chief component of almost all schemes to promote work-life balance is flexible working. This allows people to escape rigid nine-to-five schedules and work away from a formal office. IBM says that 40% of its employees today work off the company premises. For many businesses, flexible working is a necessity. Globalisation has spread the hours in which workers need to communicate with each other and increased the call for flexible shifts.

Nella Barkley, an American who advises companies on work-life balance, says that large firms are beginning to understand the value of such schemes, “but only slowly”. For most of them, they still mean little more than child care, health care and flexible working.

Yet some schemes go well beyond these first steps. American Century Investments, an investment manager in Kansas City, pays adoption expenses and the cost of home-fitness equipment for its employees. Rob Marcolina, a gay consultant with Bain & Company based in Los Angeles, was allowed time off to marry his partner in Canada, and another break to look after their daughter when she was born to a surrogate mother. Mr Marcolina, who has an MBA from the high-ranked Kellogg business school, says his employer's understanding makes him want to be “part of Bain for some time”.

Businesses have other good reasons for improving employees' work-life balance. Wegmans Food Markets, a grocery chain based in Rochester, New York, frequently appears near the top of lists of the best employers in America. It has a broad range of flexible-work programmes, which gives it one of the lowest rates of employment turnover in its industry—8% a year for full-time workers, compared with 19% across the industry.

Simple programmes can be surprisingly cost-effective. IBM, for instance, is spending $50m over five years on “dependant-care” facilities for its employees. Although that sounds generous, it is the equivalent of little more than $30 for each IBM employee every year. That is far cheaper than a pay rise and probably a better way to retain talented mothers and fathers. Ernst & Young, a global accounting firm, has a low-cost range of initiatives called “People First”. It provides breaks for people to provide care and has over 2,300 flexi-time employees in the United States. James Freer, a senior executive, says he is “absolutely convinced” the initiatives help produce better financial results.

DeAnne Aguirre, a mother of four and a senior partner in San Francisco with Booz Allen Hamilton (BAH), says “it is easy to make the business case” for work-life balance programmes at the consultancy by looking at attrition rates. BAH calculated that it was investing more than $2m in turning a raw recruit into a partner, an investment it should be reluctant to write off. Corning, an American glass company, reckons that it costs 1.5 times a worker's salary and benefits to replace him. If it can retain just 20 workers a year who would otherwise have left, Corning reckons it would produce annual savings of $2.6m.

The spread of flexible work has come about at least partly as a result of initiatives to keep women workers. Companies have had to offer extended periods of leave for them to look after dependants (young and old), and flexible working in between. At BAH, women partners take an average of eight-and-a-half extended breaks during their careers. Men take an average of one-and-a-half. Ernst & Young, keen to show that part-time workers can also become partners, recently made the first such appointment in Houston, Texas.

Some of these initiatives are spreading even to the citadels of binge working, such as investment banks. Lehman Brothers has just launched a programme called “Encore” which is aimed at easing back into the industry people who have spent time out of it (which still means mostly women). The scheme offers retraining and promises part-time work thereafter.

Business schools are now climbing on the bandwagon, too. In October Tuck School at Dartmouth, New Hampshire, will start a course on returning to corporate life after an extended absence. Called “Back in Business”, the 16-day, $12,000 re-entry programme is open only to students with “work experience in a high-potential career”.

The majority will inevitably be mothers wanting to rejoin the workforce. But fathers are also asking for sabbaticals. Work-life balance “is not just a women's issue” any more, says Ted Childs, who is in charge of workforce diversity at IBM. “Men, too, are very concerned about it.”

The demand is being stoked by the “Generation Y”, the under-28s. They look sceptically at the idea of lifetime employment within a single organisation and they are wary of the commitment they believe too often drove their parents to the divorce courts. Hay's Ms Murlis says that today's business-school graduates are “looking for a workstyle to go with their lifestyle”, not the other way round. They are happy to binge-work for a while, but in return want extended sabbaticals in which to chill out.

Many of the more imaginative schemes come from organisations that are not under pressure to report quarterly to Wall Street. Wegmans and American Century Investments are family-controlled businesses and the big accounting firms and consultancies, such as Ernst & Young, KPMG, Bain and BAH, are partnerships. This allows them to take a longer-term view of growth and costs.

To some extent, the proliferation of work-life-balance schemes is a function of today's labour market. Companies in knowledge-based industries worry about the shortage of skills and how they are going to persuade talented people to work for them. Although white-collar workers are more likely to be laid off nowadays, they are also likely to get rehired. Unemployment among college graduates in America is just over 2%. The same competition for scarce talent is evident in Britain.

Just after the dotcom boom ended in 2000, labour-market conditions were very different. Attrition rates shrank then because staff were afraid to leave. Many were offered unpaid sabbaticals for the sake of the firm's health rather than that of the individual. Such conditions may yet recur.

The European way

Europeans suggest that the reason why so many work-life initiatives come first from America is that American firms have more scope for improvement. Paid holidays there, for instance, are considerably shorter than in Europe. Flexible working and the occasional sabbatical may be the local alternative to Europe's longer annual leave, a one-off levelling of the non-pay elements of remuneration in the face of international competition.

The introduction of flexible working, of itself, gives no guarantee that employees' work-life balance will improve. The same technology that enables them to work flexibly from home or on the road also prevents them from ever leaving their office. There are lots of people who choose to sleep close to their mobile phones and their BlackBerries.

Is the fashion for work-life balance here to stay? Plenty of companies eschew such corporate programmes. Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia recently told employees to leave if they were not prepared to work weekends and long evenings over the coming months for no extra reward. Sylvia Ann Hewlett, president of the Centre for Work-Life Policy in New York, says that many workers still have what she calls “extreme jobs”. Global responsibilities and “always on” communications leave little room for balance.

Charles Handy, the author of several books on the changing nature of work, says that young workers today are increasingly “chunking” their lives, dividing them into discrete bits. These include work, parenting, travelling and doing something completely different. He believes this marks a change in attitude that is slowly filtering down from elite knowledge workers to manufacturing employees.

Heavy lay-offs in the early 1990s, mostly the result of enthusiasm for the ephemeral fad of re-engineering, changed attitudes to work. For many, downsizing sounded the death-knell for having a job for life. In “The New Deal at Work” (Harvard Business School Press), Peter Cappelli, a professor at the Wharton business school, claims that, “while employers have quite clearly broken the old deal and its long-term commitments, they do not control the new deal...it is hard to see what could make employees give that control and responsibility back to the employer.” Young skilled workers increasingly write their own terms of employment. In such a labour market, where short-term contracts are the norm, corporate schemes to improve the balance of employees' lives can become a side-show.

Some go further, arguing that in the not-too-long term, the desire of global firms to entice the West's educated elite may disappear in a flash of enthusiasm for the graduates of India's and China's tertiary-education systems. Even today, less than one in five of the world's university graduates are white men.

However, Liz Ramos, the partner at Bain & Company in charge of human capital, says that though employers are looking to India, it will be a while before India's business schools produce graduates comparable to those from Europe and America. Despite all the political heat it arouses, moving offshore satisfies only a small part of the demand for skilled labour in developed economies.

For some time to come, talented people in the West will demand more from employers, and clever employers will create new gewgaws to entice them to join. Those employers should note that for a growing number of these workers the most appealing gewgaw of all is the freedom to work as and when they please.

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8 ) Washington Post: The Art of Doing Nothing [Les Français ont perfectionné l'art de ne rien faire.]
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/08/AR2006080800981.html

The Art of Doing Nothing: And nobody does it better than the French

By Joel Achenbach
Sunday, August 13, 2006; Page W11

In Paris, you sit in the cafe, like Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir. Sitting in a cafe is one of the main activities in Paris. It's what Parisians do instead of working or jogging. They have a natural talent for it, the way Americans are good at going to the pool, grilling meat or driving interstate highways.

The crucial skill in a cafe is the ability to gear down, from second to first, and then down yet again to a special, Gallic gear that is nearly paralytic. It's a bit like being dead, but with better coffee.

The chairs in the cafes are lined up in rows, facing outward, toward the theater of Paris street life. Or perhaps it is the patrons who are on display. Their posture says: Here, look at us, full in the face, as we sit in the cafe so brilliantly, thinking our big French thoughts.

Like the other day, I was nursing an expensive thimble of wine in a cafe on the Rue de Something, near the Avenue des Whatevers, and to my immediate left sat a Frenchman in a pose so relaxed he might have been modeling for Toulouse-Lautrec. He was doing nothing, and doing it with panache. Between two fingers dangled a cigarette that remained lit even though he never did anything so animated as puff. It was hard to tell if he was truly drinking his glass of red wine; the level went down so slowly it may have been merely evaporating.

Why did he not try to achieve something? The cafe advertised WiFi, but no one had a laptop. This was not Starbucks. There was no American compulsion to multitask, to use the cafe as a caffeination station and broadband platform for another increment of accomplishment.

Conceivably I could have spoken to the Frenchman, but the language barrier is significant; I am afraid to attempt anything in French in a cafe lest it be incorrect both grammatically and existentially. Perhaps the Frenchman was dreaming up an elaborate sociohistorical theory, positing that human civilization has been in decline since the invention of the croissant. Or perhaps he was just enjoying the Latin Quarter, a section so old that I am pretty sure its residents still speak in Latin. The nearby Notre Dame Cathedral was built in the Middle Ages, when the European idea of comic relief was a stone gargoyle. Parisian commerce is quaint, which is to say, hopelessly inefficient, requiring that shoppers pay the equivalent of a charm tax. You go to one little market to buy your cheese, another to buy your jalapenos, another to buy your corn chips, another to buy your salsa; only then can you make nachos.

I had an urge to blast the Frenchman out of his reverie. "Excuse me, I'm from Wal-Mart," I could say. "We're putting in a superstore right over yonder on the Rue Dauphine. Gonna kick some serious retail derriere, ya dig?" Then, as though he could hear me thinking, the enervated Frenchman finally did something: He looked at his cellphone. Action in the cafe! He didn't make a call, let's be clear on that, but he studied the cellphone. It dawned on me: He was going over all the speed-dial listings of his mistresses.

Now we're getting down to business. Sure, he ponders the big Frenchy thoughts as he camps in the front row of the cafe, but he's also scoping out the Parisian femmes, who are tres magnifique! That is French for "bodacious." These women tend to be slinky and stylish and sophisticated, and they make American women look, by contrast, as though they just fell off a hay wagon. The femmes have an air of saucy liberation. You can imagine that they are writing Volume 4 of their projected nine-volume encyclopedia on les artes erotiques. They're on the chapter about the webbing between the toes. That lovely muscle tone in the upper arms? That's from all the time they spend on the trapeze. (Conceivably this is a projection from the tourist's subconscious: We've seen those subtitled films where a layabout Frenchman does nothing but smoke cigarettes and all the women take off their clothes.)

Eventually, I reached the obvious conclusion that the man beside me was a professional sensualist. It's a job that doesn't exist in America outside of certain Zip codes in California. For the sensualist there are long recessions, even depressions, as the economy of romance goes into a dive. One sits in the cafe and hopes for an upturn in the market.

I sympathize: It's hard work. A grind, at times. But it sure beats the heck out of doing nothing.

Read Joel Achenbach weekdays at washingtonpost.com/achenblog.

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9) WKMG TV Florida: Unusual Items Appearing On School Shopping Lists [Dans certaines écoles américaines, on veut faire payer les parents tout et n'importe quoi.]

http://www.local6.com/news/9551272/detail.html
Unusual Items Appearing On School Shopping Lists 

POSTED: 5:19 pm EDT July 20, 2006
UPDATED: 12:40 am EDT July 22, 2006

Some Central Florida school districts are passing the costs of some unique items to parents, according to a Problem Solvers investigation. The report featured Diana Hubbard, who is shopping for three children with school-issued lists that get longer and longer every year and include requests that don't much make sense to her, the report said.

Hubbard's school list showed Ziploc bags [sachets en plastique], Clorox wipes [lingettes antiseptiques], paper towels [sopalin] and paper napkins. "It's a lot of money shelled out [payer] for things I feel like I'm grocery shopping for," Hubbard said.

"Diana is not alone," Alvarez said. "We looked over dozens of lists and found items most would not consider school supplies." The listed included requests for liquid hand soap, hand sanitizers [lingettes antiseptiques], Plug-In refills [déodorisant?], toilet paper and Band-Aids [pansements adhésifs]. "Then there is the activity donation fee for supplies not provided through the school," Alvarez said.

"You just wonder where is the money going?" Hubbard said. "What are they spending money on?"

The Problem Solvers took Hubbard's question to the chief financial officer for Orange County Schools, Henry Boekhoff. Boekhoff said he had no idea teachers were asking parents for anything other than basic school supplies.

"Have you seen some of these lists?" Alvarez said. "I haven't seen them personally, no," Boekhoff said. "Somewhere there's a communication breakdown when we prepare the budget in that these items haven't been mentioned." Boekoff said when principals present their budget requests, the focus is on teacher salaries and money for more staff.

In fact, 85 percent of the estimated operating budget for the upcoming school year will go to salaries and benefits, the report said. The rest of the estimated $1.4 billion will go to utilities, textbooks and supplies. "That translates into almost $7,000 per child," Alvarez said. "But remember everything from teacher salaries to utilities are included in that figure."

John Young Elementary School Principal Regina Ponce said it doesn't leave much room for supplies. "Do we have things that probably don't belong on the list?" Ponce said. "Yes." Ponce admitted that when it comes to supplies, most schools are asking more from parents and less from the district. "The reason goes back to the bottom line -- to keep and attract more teachers. Salaries are the priority," Alvarez said. "Anytime parents can help us with the less expensive items then that's where I want to spend the bulk of the tax payer money," Ponce said. "Because those parents are taxpayers and they appreciate "A" schools and quality teachers."

Hubbard said she feels frustrated that her tax dollars don't cover things like erasers for dry erase boards [tableaux blancs]. "The list is asking parents to bring in old socks and T-shirts to use instead," Alvarez said. Alvarez also showed a list asking parents to purchase 10 glue sticks with a classroom of 30 children.

The principal said that items these this go into a reserve because getting them from the warehouse where the school district keeps its supplies could take up to a month. "So it's clear, when you shop, you're not always shopping just for your child," Alvarez said. She said if parents are fed up with the cost, they are urged to speak up at budget hearings.

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